I would like to lodge a complaint.

But since there is nowhere to which I can effectively lodge my complaint, I must be content to vent here. Lucky you.

Yesterday, the Super-Smart Lawyer and I hunkered down to watch Temptress Moon, a Chinese film that looked promising to fit our usual Film Criteria: A good movie with some nice-looking eye candy and perhaps some sexytimes.

See?

All righty then. You see at the top where it has three pull quotes from reviews? “Sensuous!,” “Ravishing!,” and “Steamy Passion!”?

The movie had none of these elements. It was a fine movie, but it was not at all what it implied, both from the picture and the pull quotes.

If the blurbs had mentioned it was “Disturbing In Its Twisted Sensuality,” or “Showing The Result of Some Very Bad Upbringing,” that would have been more true to the film itself.

In other words, the Super-Smart Lawyer and I are owed a steamy, passionate film with ravishing sensuousness.

This is the Dumbest Thing Ever: A professor at Auburn University is changing Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn to read ’slave’ instead of the n-word that Twain uses.*

Twain wrote in the customary vernacular of his time. And even if he was using the word to shock, or anything like that, it was HIS WRITING, and how he wanted to say it. A classic, even though the professor says that the word causes some readers to be uncomfortable.**

Sure. So what? Or, to put it more bluntly, so fucking what? Why can’t we examine our own discomfort with words rather than substituting words that are honestly not much less offensive? I find this so assbackwards, I can barely speak. Or type. Or whatever.

I abhor censorship, no matter how honorable–or dishonorable, for that matter–the motivation for the censorship is. Fuck that shit. It is wrong.

*I don’t type it out here because I think MY using it here would be inflammatory and also would attract spam and such I’d rather not have to filter.

**So what’s next–making Shylock less stereotypically ‘Jew-y?’ Or maybe translating Zora Neale Hurston’s writing into something more people can comprehend, since she wrote in patois?

Well, that charitable streak didn’t last long, did it? Now I am back to being Ranty McRantypants.

So here goes:

Last night, the Framptons went to an outdoors park here in Brooklyn. We brought picnic food, a blanket and a fervent desire to watch Jaws on an outdoor screen.

No, my complaints are nothing to do with how the film was presented–sure, it was hard to see the darker parts, hard to hear sometimes, but it was all part of the experience. That part was cool.

My issue is with the kids who were playing directly behind us. They certainly had energy, I’ll say that much. They were running around and SHRIEKING, at one point all crowing (!) ‘cock-a-doodle-doo!’ while their asshat parents sat in back of them and did nothing. Hello, at what point is it okay to let your kids make a ridiculous amount of noise while at least a hundred other people are trying to watch a movie? These adults would likely be the first ones to complain if my kid started gabbing in the movie theater. AND THEY WOULD BE RIGHT TO COMPLAIN.

My son didn’t let me go talk to the kids to ask them to quiet down, so I seethed for awhile until I was able to block it out.

I hate those parents. The kids I’m okay with–they were just being kids. But the parents were disrespectful and rude.

But. Really.

Not that list. That list can be summarized like so:

Clive Owen
Richard Armitage
Sean Bean (the younger; like Hans Holbein, only literally younger. Look! I made a medieval art joke!)
Takeshi Kaneshiro

edited to add: Daniel Craig

Now onto the List for today. I’ve been formulating it in my head for a few weeks now, and it surely will not be complete, but I have to get it out of my head and onto here.

The List of People I Hate (they do not deserve boldface, that’s how much I hate them):

1. George Bush
2. Car service drivers
3. Michael Brown (heckuva fucking job, my ass)
4. Jay Leno (for causing Life to be cancelled).
5. Jennifer Aniston
6. People who fling their dog crap into my unlined, empty trash can. You know, don’t you, that I will have to pluck it out and put it into a garbage bag? I don’t care that you used a NYT wrapper, it’s still your dog’s crap.
7. Tom Cruise
8. That horsey-faced conservative chick–Ann Coulter? Yeah, her.
9. Dick Cheney
10. Sarah Palin
11. Cyclists who don’t wear helmets
12. People who have loud arguments on their cell phones on the street.
13. Anyone who smirks ‘bodice ripper’ at me when they find out what I write/read. Fuck you.
14. People who say, ‘well, you couldn’t pay me to live there’ when I say I live in New York City. Nobody asked you to. In fact, bet we’re all glad you don’t.
15. The guys at my gym who preen in the mirror, then smile when they catch you looking at them. I’m just looking at you ’cause you’re so obnoxious, not ’cause you’re hot, dumbass.
16. James Cameron. Just because.
17. Bill Laimbeer (I have a long memory).
18. Isaiah Thomas (long and short memory).
19. Miley Cyrus. Not for any reason but that in every single photo she’s holding up two fingers in a smug peace sign gesture. We get it, Miley, you’re a teenager. On your Lolita-ish way to becoming a twentysomething bimbo. Good on you.
20. Kobe Bryant

Care to share?

Making fun of tourists in New York City is like shooting fish in a barrel. Hardly a challenge. But yesterday, while taking the subway, I saw a group of three girls, plus a mom, all of whom were clearly Not From Here.

One of the girls (all of whom, btw, had bangs, long hair they kept touching–hands off, you’re driving me crazy–and muffin tops) was wearing a t-shirt that read:

Country + Rap = Crap

First of all, only people who have no freaking idea what “rap” is call it rap. It’s hip-hop. Second, why are you wearing such an ‘F-You’ t-shirt here when you’re clearly outmatched in terms of cool? You’re a GUEST in this town, and GUESTS shouldn’t be so rude.

And then the mom asked me for directions, probably because I look approachable and friendly and stuff. And I felt really bad for being mean inside my head about the girl’s t-shirt. For a minute.

Megan

*Prince, “Housequake.” For Kwana.

To the woman who spent twenty minutes on the abductor machine at my gym Sunday:

I appreciate that you were enjoying the latest issue of Harper’s Bazaar, even though I stopped reading it myself when they brought in the new Editor-in-Chief, Katherine Betts, I think? (hey! I was right!), and never got back to it even when they replaced Betts with Glenda Bailey (even though I loved Marie Claire under Bailey’s stewardship. Go figure, I’m fickle).

What I don‘t appreciate is that you were sitting on the machine, not working out, which meant no-one else could get on the machine and actually use it for more than just sitting.

I hope your thighs turn into mush. I hate you.

Sincerely,

Megan

*Not the Foxy song; that’s “Gett Off,” anyway.

So the stage for true Megan-happiness is set:

iPod in ears, latest earworm Rufus Wainwright all cued up.
Maria Snyder’s Poison Study (from the library) in hand.
I am at the gym trying to work off some frustration and those damned Girl Scout cookies the Spouse brought home last night.

And then:

The iPod battery needs recharging.
And SOMEONE HAS REMOVED ALL THE PAGES AFTER P. 296. WTF?!? So I don’t know what happens after Yelena hears Valek is being accused of murder.

And Fire Study doesn’t come out until March, 2008.

I am dying inside.

Megan

*Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. You knew that, right?